In recent years, portable electronic and electrical devices have proliferated. Smart phones, portable media players, digital cameras and micro-laptops or netbooks are already ubiquitous and appear likely to continue to increase in popularity. A significant and increasing proportion of the population of these devices run on rechargeable batteries in one form or another. Hence, there is a need for a standardized interface for supplying power to devices for the purpose of recharging portable power subsystems, including batteries.
Although portable electronics themselves are typically small, lightweight and convenient, they are often come with relatively bulky, heavy chargers; necessarily so by virtue of step-down transformers and other components required to render higher-voltage, alternating current into usable, lower-voltage direct current. Moreover, the interface receptacles for device chargers and adapters are currently not standardized and vary widely. As such, consumers inevitably acquire numerous chargers and adapters associated with different electronic devices. Along with them comes the attendant clutter and inconvenience of storing the chargers, as well as the organizational challenge of determining which charger is associated with which device. Hence it is desirable: (1) to achieve a standardized means for charging portable electronic devices; (2) to create an infrastructure for supplying direct current at a usable voltage to that means; and (3) to eliminate excessive and unnecessary apparatus. Moreover, to the extent that an invention achieves these goals and becomes widely incorporated into the power delivery infrastructure, the need for separate portable electronic device chargers will be greatly diminished.
Various efforts have been made to provide in-wall, low-voltage direct current receptacles in connection with standard alternating current power outlets. For instance, published patent application U.S. 2008/0012423 by Mimran, et al., discloses an in-wall USB adaptor with a multitude of ports, and including a built-in transformer for reducing the delivered voltage, to be used as a replacement wall outlet for the purpose of providing low voltage DC current from a standard AC power supply. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 6,362,987 to Yurek, et al., discloses and claims an outlet receptacle for wiring to an AC power supply, and which includes a step-down transformer, an AC/DC converter and a female receptacle for receiving a male insert for the purpose of recharging batteries or portable electronic devices. Yurek '987 specifically discloses a cigarette lighter adapter insert/receptacle. In another instance, U.S. Pat. No. 6,943,296 to Perrella discloses a modified outlet face-plate which incorporates USB portals, but eliminates standard AC outlets entirely.
However, none of these attempts successfully constitutes a full solution to the need for an in-wall outlet system that provides simultaneous access to both alternating current outlets, bundled with low voltage direct current outlets, in a standardized, convenient configuration, allowing for similarly standardized docking stations and/or charging cradles optionally coupled to those direct current outlets.